Dropped connection requires reboot

[Tunnelcat]

I made a deal with the devil and got onto Comcast Broadband, at least for now. I swear that Comcast loves to occasionally muck with something or another that screws up the upstream signal in the middle of the day and when that happens, the modem will perform a reboot. It's normally not a problem, unless the computer is on. Then Windows 7 will flip me the bird and not reconnect me to the net, forcing me to reboot the computer to re-establish an internet connection. Is there a fix for this? I've currently got a Netgear modem (no WiFi) with a separate WiFi router in between my system and the modem. I even bought a Commscope 8 port cable amplifier/splitter with a passive return because Comcast's underground wiring has some signal loss that made using the net marginal at times. Once that was up and running, modem power and SNR levels are now all in range.

[Grendel]

Oh no, did you talk to Alyrica 1st ? (alyrica.net) I'm quite happy w/ them...

After this happens, try opening an elevated command shell (Right click Command Prompt, "Run as admin") and run

ipconfig /release

followed by

ipconfig /renew

If that doesn't work try ipconfig /release6 and /renew6. Alternatively you could try ipconfig /registerdns .

[Krom]

That, or just opening up network connections (Run: ncpa.cpl) and "repair" or disable/enable the offending connection.

Though it really should just come back without needing to cycle anything, is the LAN actually going down with it?

[Tunnelcat]

I haven't even heard of alyrica.net Grendel. Peak, yes. Them, no. I'll have to enter my address on their main page and see if I'm in their coverage area. I'm betting it's a wireless system, right? I certainly don't have fiber anywhere near my house. What speeds do they offer? Even though I'm paying for a 25 Mbps connection, they've been giving me 66 Mbps download speeds (5Mbps upload) ever since I was hooked up. Sure as hell puts anything Century Link offers to shame.

Krom, at the moment, my computer and tablet are the only things using the modem (I haven't decided if their service and price is worth it, so I'm trying it out), so I can't tell you if it's affecting other computers, other than the fact I haven't had it happen while using the tablet on WiFi.....yet. It only seems to be an afternoon issue as well, which is when I'm on the computer.

Funny thing is that if I reboot the modem in software going through the Netgear homepage, it reconnects just fine. It's only screws up if it's a spontaneous reboot and it's always preceeded by a flashing upstream LED. In fact, Netgear's manual doesn't even have an error reason for that LED to be flashing. It used to happen a lot until I repaired a couple of corroded connections and added the amplifier, but not so much now. Whatever the event is, it's throwing T3 and T4 errors like crazy. I'll try a "repair" next time it happens and see if that's a quicker workaround.

[Grendel]

I swore I will never ever give Comcast a cent so when Centurylink went down the drain I looked for an alternative. Alyrica is local, Philomath to be exact (service calls actually work ) and yes, it's a wireless system. Works well tho, they connect to the Portland backbone via fiber. Got the gamer package 20/5 Mbps, $100/mo. Their Enhanced package 12/5 Mbps for $70 probably would be sufficient if you mostly surf, watch a single HD stream and occasionally game.

[Krom]

Wow, that is expensive for a pittance of bandwidth... Or maybe I'm just spoiled by $70/1G FTTH.

You say you can reach the netgear home page of the modem, so is the cable modem actually acting as a router which is then connected to another wifi router, or is it acting like a cable modem (aka transparent bridge)?

[Tunnelcat]

Hmmm. I'm getting 66 Mbps/5Mbps for $70 a month, without any bundling (don't you rub your super speeds in our faces Krom ) . Like you noted though, service response really sucks. We had the whole neighborhood go out a while back and it pissed me off to have to deal with their Indian-based call center. I swear the bastards were having a drunken party in the background too. All they do is tell you to reboot your modem (multiple times) and then tell you everything is A OK system wide. Well, my neighbors and I weren't getting anything on our end. After getting a service technician out here on the weekend, it turned out the outage was because of a cable pullout in some amplifier because of the cold weather we had last year. I've also heard rumors that Comcast is relocating their call centers to America however. We'll see. What I do now is if it's a work day and the problem is not on my end, I'll drive up to Comcast in Lewisburg and put in a request there.

Krom, the modem reboot happened again today at 3:00 PM, about the same time it always seems to happen. They're doing something to the system during this time of day. This time, after a few minutes, Windows reconnected by itself. I still had to reboot the modem in software again because the upstream LED kept flashing. Krom, my router has WiFi and is in between the modem and the computer, so I don't know what happens when the modem reboots when the tablet is on. I think the tablet is smarter in that it will try to reconnect. I also made sure to get a modem without WiFi. I didn't want to have to contribute to Comcast's WiFi net.

[Krom]

Everything should reconnect more or less as soon as the modem finishes syncing up itself, because none of the IP addresses should have changed in that interval. Even if the whole neighborhood goes down (and it probably does), the DHCP leases are usually for like 24 hours so everyone would get the same IP back unless it was down for much longer. Although if you have no background traffic sources windows may take a minute or two to test for connectivity itself (it only checks when there is no other traffic on the link, since the presence of traffic alone is good enough otherwise).

The upstream LED flashing could indicate the modem is unable to lock to the upstream channel. How old is this modem anyway? Comcast is pretty aggressive about rolling out DOCSIS 3.1 upgrades, so this modem could be considerably behind the times already if it is just a plain 4x4 DOCSIS 3.0 modem.

[Tunnelcat]

It's only about a year old and it's a Netgear CM500-100 modem with DOCSIS 3.0. It was on Comcast's compatible list when I got it, which was purchased right before I found out that DOCSIS 3.1 was coming out. Figures. I could get a new one free from Comcast, but I wanted one without the built in WiFi that they want "public" to assist with their local net, so I purchased it myself. I'll just have to live with the quirk until I either go to some other service, or decide to stick with Comcast. It depends if Comcast either jacks up the price, forces everyone to DOCSIS 3.1 or gets even lousier service than they have now. There isn't a lot of choice around here.

[Krom]

The solution is to go to the hardware store and buy a roll of metal window screening (very important it be metal and not plastic or fiberglass) and wrap the supplied comcast modem in a couple loose layers of it. The wifi range of the supplied modem will be inches at best and it can be safely stuffed in some out of sight corner of the basement and forever ignored.

[Tunnelcat]

I was actually thinking to doing that. I have an old defunct microwave and was thinking of taking out and using the metal door screening.

Would it be worth it to get a DOCSIS 3.1 modem? The one I've got seems to be working fine, except for the occasional lost connection issue upon reboot.

[Krom]

I would say it depends entirely on the cost, if you can get a 3.1 for little or no cost then go for it, but if it requires a $5+/mo rental fee then forget it.

Also worth noting that there is one more upgrade in the pipe: DOCSIS 3.1 Full Duplex, but that is probably the end of the line for significant upgrades on coaxial cable because FD will use all the spectrum available on the system. Nowhere else to go after that but to optical fiber.

[Tunnelcat]

I would say it depends entirely on the cost, if you can get a 3.1 for little or no cost then go for it, but if it requires a $5+/mo rental fee then forget it.

Also worth noting that there is one more upgrade in the pipe: DOCSIS 3.1 Full Duplex, but that is probably the end of the line for significant upgrades on coaxial cable because FD will use all the spectrum available on the system. Nowhere else to go after that but to optical fiber.

Yeah, I'm not going to pony up more equipment rental fees to Comcast. The DVR is bad enough. If this modem ever dies, I'll upgrade on my own dime. As for fiber being put in, fat chance. I doubt they'd ever spend the capital. Comcast seems focused on content, not infrastructure. Well, if they don't upgrade the infrastructure, the content is worthless.

[Krom]

Yep, and after Full Duplex, coax will be stuck in the same boat DSL is in; faster speeds may become available, but at a cost of ever decreasing range. At least a couple times a year I see an article on some new DSL tech that claims it can compete with gigabit fiber, but it only takes a moment of digging to see they are expressing the effective range of it being able to reach even 500 megabits is usually in the neighborhood of 100-200 feet at the most, and bandwidth drops off rapidly after that. Fiber is the only real path to the future because it can do 1+ gigabit over a distance of 20 kilometers (and was already doing so decades ago).

Any further advances in copper networking are going to be confined to high density apartment complexes and the like. Copper is going to be totally worthless for the majority of people who don't live in a high rise apartment complex by the time second or third generation passive optical fiber networks start making it practical to push over 10 gigabits down a residential line. Then the people who already ran the fiber are going to be laughing all the way to the bank.

[Capm]

While I think there is more life left in Coax than you think, I essentially agree with you. Most future cable tech is Fiber deep, with the next step beyond docsis 3.1 being fiber to the tap (every tap becomes a node) pushing out 25GHZ down the coax drop (most current cable systems are 750mhz to 1ghz) but really, how soon do you think you're going to need 40gigs of bandwidth in both directions to your house? Docsis has a long way to go before 3.1 gives way to that model.

The big deal for me is that fiber drops are difficult to install and repair if something bad happens to it, vs a coax drop which can be repaired/replaced in minutes, so if you want to feel safe with your fiber, you've got to bury it, which is expensive, especially in rural areas. Also, ONT's are 3x the cost vs sticking a modem in the house.

So there are a few things that are keeping widespread pure FTTH adoption down, but it is getting cheaper, and eventually it will replace all copper, but we're probably a good 30 years from that being a reality in the majority of locations - not that it couldn't be done sooner, but that getting it paid for (a business model that allows for returns in just a few years) will take longer in many locations.

[Tunnelcat]

Hell, I'll probably be dead by then.

[Krom]

Yeah, I saw the whole process when the guy installed the fiber in our place. Running the drop was simple, the shielding is thinner than coax and it slips right in the house and bends fairly easily around corners. But stripping it down took more than a pair of wire cutters, there were a lot of fine layers and then actually joining up the drop with the plug at the end required a tool that actually melts and fuses the glass together.

Where as a coax drop requires a $2 coax stripper tool and crimp on plugs that just about any idiot can use even while nursing a hangover, letting the cable company keep the labor cheap.

It is worth noting that the tool our installer used to join the fiber was hand-held, battery operated and required all of 10 seconds to actually make the splice. It only took him a few minutes total to make all the physical connections, the longest time working the hardware was prepping and mounting the ONT and the battery backup for it. ONTs may also be more expensive right now, but I remember when you could spend $250 on a dial-up modem. This isn't something that is going to be significantly more expensive than coax forever.

[Tunnelcat]

The problem is, the closest fiber is a good mile from my house along a main drag. Century Link put that in about 5 years ago to increase the speeds to their remote terminal from the downtown switching location. They'd have to run the fiber from the remote terminal clear up through the entire neighborhood, underground, since we don't have overhead utilities. I don't see either of the telecoms having a good reason to spend the capital right now when they can milk the copper wire that's already in the ground for a few years.

Have you heard anything about the newer wireless technologies, like 5G perhaps?

[Krom]

I see lots of mostly marketing people saying 5G will be so fast it will compete with wired internet, my answer to that is "they said the same thing about LTE" and we know how that turned out.

[Tunnelcat]

Typical. I guess I'll have to wait and see.

[Capm]

That handheld splicer is probably $15-19,000 The one I use that sits on a desk and is about 6 inches cube is $10,000 Thats about half what they were 10 years ago, so its coming along.

Wireless has some fundamental problems. Those being, to get more bandwidth, you go higher in frequency, which shortens your range. If you need more bandwidth at a particular frequency, you try a wider channel - which shortens your range. Then there are only so many channels available in a given frequency range - you can never get enough bandwidth to a tower. To get any kind of bandwidth, you have to overlap AP's with different frequencies on the tower and make sure you don't interfere with another operator, and none of them can you roam between because they all are specific to a particular range, so you hope you don't get on a frequency where the AP has too many people on it because why stop selling when the AP is full? phhtt!

And thats just the tip of the iceberg with wireless issues.

[Krom]

The other trick to understanding wireless is to not think about it being wireless, but instead think about it like it is actually a wire, but just ONE wire that everyone in range is connected to. Only one device can talk on the "wire" at a time (including the tower itself) or you get a collision and it has to start over again. Then it gets even more complicated when you realize that the signal from towers actually overlap each other by design.

The thing they are promising with 5G is that there will be a lot more towers, but with a lot less range for each tower. Meaning each tower has to share less airspace, so there will be fewer devices on each tower, so each device can have a bigger share of the time and get more performance. But this does in fact mean they are trading range for performance, which also means 5G will be largely worthless outside of a major population center. And once again rural America gets screwed.

[Capm]

Yea, because the biggest cost of the tower is often getting fiber to the tower, especially in rural areas. Then you have terrain and trees... just picking a good spot for the tower requires some brains, then you have to be able to acquire said spot, then there are zoning and land permits, FCC permits just to have a tower and most fixed wireless is either licensed or "lightly"-licensed, so then you have to have permits for that, oh not to mention you have to buy the spectrum, providing you can get it when they auction it off, and usually when that happens is before there is even any equipment for that spectrum, so then you hope and pray that your AP's come in at less than $20k each once they finally become available.

I hate wireless.